“Your daughter is the best thing that ever happened to my son.” Mark’s dad said as he shook my father’s hand. “She is just marvelous. You must be so proud of her.” he added. My father looked surprised, confused, mystified. He appeared to be at a loss of words; my father is never at a loss of words. One thing he didn’t appear was proud.
“You must be so proud of your dad”, the lady in the dazzling white sari said at the award ceremony. “He is a very smart man. Are you as smart as he is?” she asked me. “I am.” I answered without missing a beat, I was 9 years old. This evoked laughter among the adults around me. “She is your daughter indeed, Srivastav”, the lady said to my father with a chuckle. My father smiled benevolently at me, neither acknowledging nor refuting my statement. Maybe he thought I was as smart as he was. Or maybe not.
But we were sure – Mark & I – that we wanted to adopt. We looked into adoption, even international adoption – from India – and all of it felt like a tedious, bureaucratic affair that took years out of one’s life.
The Jazz Club we were at, is called Reduta. It is located in Prague, which is the capital city of Czech Republic, and which is where I was exactly one month ago.
I was invited to be the Keynote speaker by Farmingdale State College Multicultural Committee at their annual gala. Following is my full keynote.
I left India and flew back to America to my empty life. I got back into work. Amidst nightmares of losing Didi and days of bawling with grief, I somehow planned a trip – to spend Didi’s birthday; Mar 19th in Venice. Human beings are strange.
As the year passed, we discovered a phenomenon called “New Year’s Eve at Times Square”. It was all anyone would talk about – the exhilaration of the countdown leading to the ball drop and the romance of kissing a lover under a rain of confetti to the tune of John Lennon’s Imagine reminding us to live for today.
It was Christmas morning and I had just woken up. I was 8 years old and had never received a Christmas gift before in my life..
I started the Crossing Party Lines – Long Island chapter in Feb 2023. It has been an incredibly rewarding experience.
What tea would you like?” asked the waitress as she flipped open the top of a tea box in front of us.
“English Breakfast” said I AND Mark, almost in unison.
I looked at Mark and said “English Breakfast?”
“You are the red in my painting, the color in my life.” I said to my sister.
“And you are the light in mine”, said she to me.
“Delhi Burning” screamed the headlines of a major newspaper. It was November 2nd 1984, and riots plagued Delhi, after the then Indian Prime Minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi was gunned down by her own Sikh bodyguards. When the news of her assassination broke, mobs of Hindus filled with rage took to the streets in Delhi, seeking vengeance & killing any Sikhs they came across. Two days after her death, most areas of my city were under total curfew as the flames of communal fire erupted in neighborhood after neighborhood.
We make this journey of life looking for a home – which actually appears to me is the place where we are loved – fully, wholeheartedly, just as we are. It doesn’t mean we don’t do the work – because finding home or love requires “home-work”. As Kahlil Gibran said “When love beckons to you follow him, though his ways are hard and steep.”
I have never remembered my mother as much as I have in the past couple of years, nor have I missed her as much, nor have I channeled her as much.
“How on earth are we going to find any men if we never go on any dates?”
“The doorbell will ring, we will open the door and there they will be…”
My sister responded to my frustrated question with a grin, the gorgeous dimples on her cheeks deepening, her arm dramatically making the wide gesture of opening a door. She winked at me and added in her usual know-it-all attitude “….when the time is right.”
“Of course!” I said, rolling my eyes.
